Recently, coated paper of this type serving as lower ignition propensity paper for cigarettes is becoming known. The lower ignition propensity paper can reduce the risk of spread of fire to combustible materials even if an ignited cigarette wrapped in this paper drops thereon. Specifically, coated paper serving as lower ignition propensity paper is obtained by applying bands of a liquid-form lower ignition propensity material to a web at predetermined longitudinal intervals, and then drying. However, applying a liquid-form lower ignition propensity material to the web surface in this manner leads to production of longitudinal wrinkles in the web during drying, and thus, the resulting coated paper, or lower ignition propensity paper has deteriorated quality.
To remove the longitudinal wrinkles, an idea of providing a smoothing roller on a web transport path has been presented. The smoothing roller has a circumference with a pair of elastic helical ridges arranged symmetrically with respect to a center position dividing the length of the smoothing roller into halves (patent document 1).